Hear My Heart Burst
by foreverwriting9
Summary: She goes home that night and practices making origami frogs.


_So wear me like a locket around your throat,_

_I'll weigh you down,_

_I'll watch you choke._

_You look so good in blue._

_You look so good in blue._

**Fall Out Boy, 'Nobody Puts Baby In the Corner'**

XXX

This is _not a love story_.

I.

Their first case together, he just _watches _her.

She has the prettiest green eyes and she hates him, and that might be _exactly_ what he needs.

"Why are you doing that?" She frowns at the road through the windshield, and Jane decides that annoying her could become his new favorite pastime.

"What?" he asks, all innocence and childishness.

She turns and scowls at him, and his cold, empty heart gives a dull thud somewhere in his chest. "You're staring at me," she says. "Stop it. It's disconcerting."

He shoots her his flashiest smile. "Some people might be appreciative of my attention."

Lisbon turns a corner sharply, practically throwing Jane from his seat. "Have those people told you recently that you might be a pompous jackass?"

He laughs, gripping onto his seat as she turns another corner. "You don't like me." (_The boy wonder sees all_.)

She doesn't respond, but the subtle narrowing of her eyes tells him all he needs to know.

"You will," he promises. "Eventually."

"Don't hold your breath."

Jane leans over the center console to get her attention, his fingers catching on the sleeve of her shirt. Then he takes a huge, exaggerated breath and clamps his mouth shut.

Lisbon rolls her eyes. "I'm not taking you to the hospital when you pass out."

He simply smiles at her and continues holding his breath, counting off the seconds until she begins to like him.

_One, two, three, four_-

XXX

II.

They lose Red John (_again_), and this time, it is completely Lisbon's fault. She refuses to acknowledge that the evidence all points directly to Red John, and won't even let Jane broach the topic with her. (She tries to believe that, just this once, if she ignores it, it will go away.

She is terribly, terribly _wrong._)

Jane forgives her.

After the case, Lisbon finds him sitting on her couch, staring at the ceiling, and her first instinct is to run away from him. Instead, she walks over to him, the tips of her shoes bumping into his when she stops herself in front of him a second too late.

He looks at her, slightly startled. "Hello, Lisbon."

"I'm sorry," she blurts out for the hundredth (_thousandth_, _millionth_) time, and honestly, she hates those words.

His gaze is steady, and no matter how hard she looks, Lisbon cannot find any anger in his too blue eyes. "I don't blame you, Lisbon," Jane says carefully, moving forward on the couch until his knees knock into hers.

Lisbon shakes her head. "It was my fault Jane. I should have done a better job, I should have listened to you-"

"You can't change the past, dear," he says softly, tugging on her sleeve until she sits down beside him.

"But-"

"Hush, Lisbon."

They sit in silence then, not quite touching, their eyes trained on the snow white ceiling above them. Jane taps her wrist after a few minutes, a cheeky grin tugging at the corners of his mouth, and the moment shifts, suddenly taking on a whole new color.

"Can you repeat what you said about needing to listen to me? I need to record it this time."

Lisbon resists the urge to smack him, and instead settles on simply rolling her eyes. "You tell anyone I said that and I might just use you for target practice."

He smiles, leaning into her personal space and taking her breath away. "You would never."

"Try me, Jane. Just try me."

His smile falters a bit. "Don't tempt me, Lisbon."

She opens her mouth to say something, to somehow regain control of the conversation and return it to safe ground, when Cho walks in.

"Boss, we just got another case."

Lisbon closes her mouth, nods, and then stands up to leave her office. She stops in the doorway, turning to look back at Jane. "You coming?"

"Of course." His smile doesn't quite reach his eyes this time, and Lisbon wants to tell him that he doesn't have to come, that it might be too soon, but _he closes cases_ and they really do need him.

They walk out of the building together a couple minutes later, Jane's hand pressed against the small of her back, and Lisbon swears she'll make it up to him.

(She goes home that night and practices making origami frogs.)

XXX

III.

Jane dreams a lot.

In his dreams, there is fire and evil and _strawberries and cream _and red, red, _red_. It suffocates him.

_Deep breath, count back from one hundred. One hundred, ninety-nine, ninety-eight-_

Sometimes he dreams of Lisbon too.

He stands near her while they observe a bloody smiley face on the wall in front of them and he whispers in her ear. _Let's pretend our hands aren't bathed in blood, that we fit together perfectly_-

She turns and looks at him, brilliant green eyes flashing.

-_sixty-seven, sixty-six, sixty-five_-

"Jane."

He leans forward, tracing her spine with his fingertips. _I will never leave you, Lisbon, I promise_.

"Jane."

-_thirty-four, thirty-three_-

"_Jane_."

His eyes flutter open. "Lisbon?"

She's leaning over him, the hazy attic light bursting from behind her shoulder. "Hey there, Sleeping Beauty," she says, her voice full of amusement.

He grins at her, lazily stretching out across his makeshift bed. "Hey."

"Tod Clarkson is in interrogation right now, if you'd like to come watch," she says, sliding her hands into her pockets and rocking back onto her heels.

Jane stands up, unrolling his shirtsleeves. "Excellent." He mock bows to her. "Lead the way, Agent Lisbon."

XXX

IV.

He saves her.

Lisbon goes off to investigate by herself, and is suddenly being held at knifepoint, and _Jane saves her _with one of his ingenious (foolish) plans.

She finds him later, after all the paperwork has been filled out and all the questions answered, and she pushes a fresh cup of tea into his hands. "Thank you, Jane," she says, sinking down onto the couch beside him.

His smile is _real_. "We're partners," he says, with a half-shrug, as though it's that uncomplicated. "I'll always have your back."

Lisbon nods slowly, trying to come up with the words to express just how much that means to her. She doesn't have to though, because he understands, _he knows her_.

"I promise," Jane says, leaning in toward her and noticing how her eyes darken. His fingers brush over her knee lightly and then are gone in an instant as he takes a sip from the cup in his hands. The corners of his eyes crinkle when he realizes that she has made the tea perfectly.

"You're getting better at this."

Her brow furrows in confusion, and sometimes he forgets that she _can't_ actually read his mind. "What?"

He gestures with his tea cup. "Making tea, Lisbon. You're practically a professional."

"Well, I didn't want you throwing a tantrum because your tea wasn't stirred in the right direction-"

Jane presses a hand to his chest, pretending to be offended. "I'm going to act like you're not being facetious."

Lisbon laughs, and it's the best sound Jane's heard in a long time.

"So," he pauses, tilting his head at her, and watching as the fading sunlight filters through her curls, "do you want a cup of tea, Lisbon?"

Her smile is positively blinding and Jane suddenly finds that he can't breathe. "Sure, Jane," she says, running her fingers along the edges of his couch, and sometimes, this is _home._ "I'd love some."


End file.
